Divergence
by rueyeet
Summary: A slew of stories I wrote based on Zarla's Vargas, in which Johnny did not kill Edgar in Issue 2 of JtHM. We all knew he'd get around to it, though, didn't we? Vague implications of NnyEdgar slash.
1. Quiet

This occurs between Ch. 9 ("Misplace") and Ch. 10 ("Empty") of Zarla's "Vargas", during the night Johnny spent at Edgar's apartment.

Johnny C. and Edgar Vargas appear quite without the courtesy of their original creator Jhonen Vasquez, who would be well advised to stay as far away from this bit of "writing" as possible. If not, I should fear for his digestion. Scriabin is Zarla's.

* * *

QUIET  
by rueyeet

The problem with late-night television was that it sucked. Nothing but infomercials and re-runs and porn and test patterns and other useless noise. Obscure movies, sometimes, if you were lucky--which he, of course, was not. Johnny flipped through the channels a couple times and disgustedly turned off the TV.

Immediately, the silence returned.

He'd wanted quiet, had come here at least partly so the voices would stop pestering him, pulling at him, trying to tear him apart or reassemble him in their own image--he wasn't sure anymore. He just wanted them to SHUT UP a second. Leave him alone for once. And they did. They couldn't come here, couldn't touch him in this place. For once, it was blessedly, wonderfully quiet.

Johnny shivered, holding tight to himself, and looked around. That was the problem. It was TOO quiet--not just aurally, but visually. Everything in the apartment looked like a design magazine, carefully color-coordinated in neutral shades, contemporary shapes, with just enough art on the walls and books on the shelves and carefully chosen items on the tables to offset the decor. Nothing, though, that would betray the fact that anyone actually lived here. Nothing that wasn't neat and clean and tidy and decorator-perfect. It was like being inside a catalog, except more impersonal. Sterile. Lifeless. It gave him the creeps.

How could Edgar stand to live here? Edgar wasn't like the others, wasn't empty inside, wasn't one of the incomprehensible things that walked around wearing a face and pretending to be a human being. He was real. Edgar talked to him, listened to him, let him come over, tried his best to understand what even Johnny himself could not. He...cared.

Johnny couldn't for the life of him understand why. Why did Edgar allow this contact? Why didn't he run away? Why didn't he hate Johnny, like everyone else? There were so many reasons Edgar should have hated him. Johnny had tried to kill him, for one thing. Twice--or was it three times?--he couldn't remember. Because, as he'd told Edgar in so many words, he was indisputably and utterly insane. As if Edgar wouldn't have noticed that by now, wouldn't _know_ what he was...Johnny's mind teetered dizzily above the fathomless abyss of self-loathing, hesitated there a moment, and veered away.

Music. That was it. He should put on some music. Everyone had music. That would relieve the oppressive silence. He jumped up, searching for some CDs. Usually he had some with him, but had thought bringing his own entertainment might have seemed rude. It hadn't occured to him that Edgar would want to sleep. Of course he would. Edgar was normal. Not like Johnny..._no. stop it._

Dammit, didn't the man have any CDs? What kind of person didn't have any music?

What kind of person...?

Feeling suddenly chilled, Johnny half-sat, half-fell into the nearest chair, curling into himself in involuntary defense. He looked around wide-eyed at the cold, blank austerity surrounding him. What if Edgar _was_ just like all the rest of them? What if he was hiding behind that calm and accomodating face, just waiting to laugh, to mock, to despise? How was he to know? How certain could one ever be about what goes on in someone else's head?

All this time, he'd talked to Edgar--no, _at_ him, like the wall Johnny had likened him to--kept calling him, kept up this unexpected thread of contact, simply because Edgar listened. And Edgar always listened, never giving anything away, only barely reacting at all, except when Johnny poked him just to see him jump, to see something on his face, even if it was fear. It was maddening, really. Edgar was impossible to fathom. Passive. Impassive. Terrifying, because he never really knew what Edgar was thinking. He'd been afraid to wonder what Edgar really thought of anything he'd said. Afraid to know who Edgar really _was_. God. _What kind of person...?_

Restlessly he unwound himself from the chair and paced through the small apartment, flicking on light switches as he went, looking for any trace of Edgar in it. He detested consumerism, and its attendant expression of petty prehistoric urges through the never-ending accumulation of _things_, but even he had to admit that people's possessions did reflect them, in a way. Not that a person could really be defined by their dining room set, per se, but most people's homes did have some kind of personal touch. Pictures lovingly framed. Notes tacked to fridge doors. Objects in rememberance of a gift, or a loved one, or a vacation. He'd stolen into enough homes, peeked curiously into enough windows, to know.

Not Edgar, though. Johnny looked more closely at the pictures on the walls, at the decorative odds and ends placed just so, and had the impression that they'd been chosen not because Edgar liked them, but because they went with everything else. It was distinctly eerie. Growing more unnerved by the minute, he essayed a more thorough search, opening drawers and examining the contents, picking up objects and putting them back down absently. He discovered nothing that could tell him what he wished to know. He began to pull Edgar's disappointingly small collection of books down from their shelves, flipping through them impatiently and tossing them aside. Bestsellers, coffee table books, reference materials; read once, perhaps, and consigned to the shelf. Nothing. Nothing except...Johnny reached for the last book eagerly, seeing that its pages showed some sign of actual use, only to realize that he was holding a Bible. He snorted softly. Of course. He should have known.

There was a bookmark in it, towards the back, in what Johnny fuzzily remembered would be the New Testament. He opened it to the marked page and read:

"Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things."

Johnny stared very hard at the page. Love.

_Love is patient, love is kind. Is not provoked. Does not take into account wrongs suffered. Bears all things, believes all things. Endures all things._

The words reminded him of Edgar.

Johnny had no use for the Bible--for all he knew, God really _was_ a lazy little lawn gnome spending eternity sleeping off Creation--but he knew that Edgar believed in this stuff. He didn't talk about it much, and seemed almost embarrassed whenever his religion came up in conversation, but Johnny knew that Edgar's faith was very important to him.

_A heaven for me, and a hell for you_.

Did that mean?...could that possibly mean? Johnny's heart leaped with a keen and painful hope, and yet pounded in rhythm to a dreadful fear. Was Edgar simply following the directives of his faith? Or was it something more...specific?

Completely unsettled now, his nerves tingling with alternating currents of terror and excitement, he carefully replaced the Bible on the shelf, and surveyed the now-cluttered room. Half-started thoughts flitted through his mind, chased each other, then vanished when he tried to focus on them. Focus. He needed to focus. He needed to write, to funnel the chaos into words, to put his thoughts down in a more permanent form to keep them from constantly getting away from him. He often did that, when he wanted to try and work something out for himself, without the voices tearing at him.

Except...damn. No backpack meant not only no CDs, but no Die-ary. _Fuck._ Johnny clenched his fists in frustration, and looked vainly for some paper. Goddammit, didn't the man have a desk? His mind conjured a shadowy image--imagination or memory?--of a desk next to a bed. He started toward the closed bedroom door, then stopped, feeling that uneasy tingling again. Turning away, he saw one of the books, lying open on the floor, its blank back page beckoning to him. Guilt fought briefly with the overwhelming impulse to impose some kind of control over the mess in his head, and lost. After a quick search and some experimentation, he found a suitable pen in the canister beside the telephone, and sat cross-legged on the floor to write. After just a few lines, he jumped up again, distracted. Thirsty. He went to get some soda.

The fridge was as spartan as the apartment, and there was no soda whatsoever. What the hell? What kind of person didn't have any soda? What, did Edgar have some kind of objection to caffiene? _What kind of person... _Johnny slammed the fridge closed, disappointment contributing to his already agitated state. He stalked back to his spot on the floor and dug his anger into the book's waiting page. Feeling mollified, he went and got some water, sipping it as he considered his next words. The apartment's blandness scraped at his nerves. There was nothing alive here. The page filled with his uneven handwriting as he contemplated it. Nothing alive here except Edgar, who slept. And Johnny himself, who didn't belong. Maybe that was why he felt so jittery. He reread the last line he'd written, staring at the words as if they had further secrets to reveal.

_Scared of him._ Ironic. Johnny was supposed to be the dangerous one, wasn't he?

Dissatisfied, he got to his feet. He'd come here for quiet, but it was driving him crazy. Well--crazier. He smiled, a brief lunatic grin. Grabbing the remote from the couch, he pointed it at the TV, flipping channels until he found something tolerable, and turned down the volume so it wouldn't wake Edgar. Peaceful, sleeping Edgar. He found another book and tried again. This time, it was his growling stomach that distracted from his task. _Fucking organics!_ He strode impatiently back to the kitchen.

There were no chips, either. Johnny shook his head in disbelief. Edgar must be some kind of health nut. Maybe he should check the fridge for tofu and bean sprouts. He didn't want to raid the cabinets again, not after the Skettio episode. Edgar hadn't liked him throwing his food around. His innards made more noises, but he told them to shut the hell up, and commenced to ignore them. Back to writing, then.

Soon he'd filled another page. He skimmed through the entry. Did he always ramble on like that? Christ. Unwillingly, his eyes were drawn to where he'd started to talk about the coat Edgar had given him. He'd wanted to write that he loved it, but been unable to use the word. It looked lame, crossing something out only to write it again. He shut the book, put it down, went to find a different one. Remembering to put the now-empty water glass in the sink--surely Edgar would approve--Johnny settled in front of the TV and went through the channels again. Amazingly, one of his favorite cartoons was on. Acclimated to the low noise level, he didn't bother turning up the volume; just smiled happily, and continued to write during the commercial breaks.

It was becoming clear that he had a decision to make. _I should tell him. Everything will be just perfect._

Except that he didn't _know_ that. _I'm afraid of him. Afraid of him turning into one of the others. Turning against me._ How could he risk so much, take the chance of wrecking everything, when he didn't know what Edgar would do? _What kind of a person..._

Dammit. He blinked back tears, scribbling furiously, trying to talk himself into taking action. It didn't work. The cartoon ended, the page was full, and now he was all on edge again. He didn't want to wake Edgar up; was sure Edgar would be angry with him. Messing up his kitchen, ransacking his apartment...Johnny looked around despairingly. He couldn't even clean up the mess he'd made; he couldn't remember where anything went. Edgar would never want him to come over again. Distressed, Johnny paced out the confines of the apartment once more, finding himself in front of the closed door to the bedroom. Rocking from foot to foot in an agony of indecision, he spun about, and went back towards the living room. He'd gone back and forth several times before he mouthed a strangled curse under his breath and went back to pick up another book. The words came disjointedly now, his thoughts refusing to be corralled into something as limiting as words, and certainly nothing so restrictive as complete sentences. He threw the offending book away from him, and stood shaking.

_Can't do this. Going to run. Never going to get this right. Never ever going to get this right._

_...I want to do this right._

Maybe he should look in the bedroom. Maybe Edgar kept the things that were important to him close to where he slept, away from prying guests. Maybe something in there would tell him what he needed to know. With the unconscious yet practiced stealth of a stalker, Johnny padded soundlessly down the hallway, even with heavily booted feet. Just as silently, he edged into the room, closing the door behind him and pausing to let his eyes adjust to the dim light afforded by the streetlights through the thin curtains. He did not look toward the bed, or its occupant, but automatically noted the deep, even breathing. Johnny took a deep breath of his own, and began his investigation.

With increasing consternation, he opened drawers, pulled out clothing and desk supplies and personal effects, this time paying enough attention to put them back, more or less. There was nothing here either. In mounting dismay, he opened the closet and began taking things off hangers. Edgar dressed as if he picked his clothes to go with his apartment. Everything was mundane, ordinary, frighteningly normal, like a focus group had picked his wardrobe. Another trench coat hung there, its black a contrast with the monotonous neutrals, succeeding only in looking like it didn't belong there at all.

God_dammit_!

Unwillingly, Johnny approached the bed, panic welling in him, tears starting to prickle behind his eyes. Aimlessly he picked up random things around the room, putting them down again, none of them giving him anything. Suddenly he stopped and stared. Next to the phone, near the bed, was an action figure. Fighting down hysterical laughter at the sheer ridiculousness of Edgar having such a thing, he dropped the desk lamp he was holding, and went and picked it up.

He had found the only bit of individuality in the entire place.

It stuck out like a sore thumb, so clearly did it not belong with everything else. Well, except maybe the trench coat. The small figure was oddly familiar. He racked his addled brain for a long moment. Oh, yes, that Zeitgeist movie. Yet another intriguing idea sabotaged by the Hollywood requirement that anything vaguely science fiction must be an effects-heavy action blockbuster. Funny he should remember that, when he remembered so little. Where had Edgar gotten the thing? He fiddled with the toy, amused, twisting the arms into a gesture of surrender. Unbidden, a very clear image of the character rose into his mind--_Scriabin, wasn't it?_--and he suddenly saw the resemblance to Edgar. Something about that, something about the little toy, made him uneasy. No longer amused, Johnny shoved Scriabin's figure into a drawer and viciously shut the little toy in. Beside him, Edgar murmured and turned over, but did not wake.

That was it. That was the sum total of what the apartment could tell him about Edgar. And he still didn't know a damn thing. All that was left was...Edgar himself.

Spent, tired, and afraid, Johnny walked over to the window and looked out. He caught his breath. Despite the lateness (or earliness?) of the hour, the moon was only just rising, and it lingered huge and pale and beautiful over the rooftops. He threw aside the curtain and opened the window with that same automatic stealth, then stood transfixed. Feelings, deep and incohate, welled up in him, pulling him inside himself. Everything else faded, becoming insubstantial, somehow far away. How long he stood there unthinking, submerged within himself and drowning in unguessable distance, he couldn't say; but eventually he felt behind him, encountered the bed and settled there on the edge of it like a wild thing coming to rest.

He'd woken Edgar. At the periphery of his vision and the edge of his awareness, he heard Edgar stir, saw him peer around the dark room, squinting futilely without his glasses.

"You asked me..." Johnny tried to grasp the tail ends of his scattered thoughts, tried to frame them in a way that would make sense to anyone else, to force something through the dark strangeness that wanted to immobilize him. He managed only a whisper, sounding lost even to himself. "You asked me if there was anything that made me happy."

"Yeah..." Even half-asleep, Edgar tried to reply, tried to show that he was listening. Johnny wanted to smile at that. He tried again to reach across the barrier, to communicate, to make Edgar understand.

"The moon..." His thoughts swirled and muddied, beyond comprehension or language. How could he explain? "The moon does...make me happy. The moon and the stars...look at it..."

The round moon filled his vision, perfect in its simplicity, alone in the vastness of sky, and yet whole, serene, beautiful. He drifted in the sight, wishing for that peace, that soothing coldness to quiet the fragmented clamoring chaos in his head, that many-sided tug-of-war that threatened to reduce his mind to its component particles every moment of his existence. Dimly he felt the small shifting of the bed, a soft scrape against the night table as Edgar felt for his glasses, and recalled that he wasn't alone. That there was something he had wanted to say.

"It is...it's rather pretty sometimes." Edgar said tentatively. Ah, Edgar. _Always patient, always kind_.

He attempted a reply, still stranded within himself. "It's..." No. That wouldn't make any sense. He cast about, formed a dozen different beginnings, discarded them all. "I can't explain it, really." Unconsciously, Johnny leaned slightly closer, as if physical proximity would bridge the gap that words could not.

"You can try," Edgar encouraged him. He also leaned a little closer, looking somehow younger without his glasses. "I'll listen."

"You'll listen..." Yes, he would. Edgar was always there for him. Was never provoked. Never took into account the wrongs he had suffered. Bore everything. Endured everything. Johnny drew a deep breath, and slowly, almost reluctantly, went to sit next to Edgar. "You listen to me," he said, marvelling at the truth of it, turning it over in his mind like a rare and precious thing.

"Yes..." The affirmative trailed off, inviting a response. And Edgar waited, watching him, ready for whatever might come. Still afraid--his hands played with the covers in the futile attempt to relieve the tension in him--but willing to hear whatever Johnny had to say. Without mockery or judgement or hate. Just there...for him.

Suddenly Johnny saw that he understood everything about Edgar that he needed to. None of the other, extraneous things mattered. He would tell him. He would explain everything. And even if Edgar didn't understand, he would try to. He wouldn't fight. Edgar would never, ever fight him, never try to hurt him. Because, for God only knew what reason, as wildly improbable as it was, Edgar..._loved_ him. He looked back towards the window, hiding his exultation.

It would be perfect. As perfect as the moon, bright against the dark cloudless sky. And all at once, Johnny found that he did, in fact, have something he wanted to say. The words came clearly, firmly.

"I want to tell you something. It's important."

* * *

Passage quoted from the New American Standard Bible, 1 Corinthians 13:4-7.

This story can also be found at Zarla's site--www(dot)ashido(dot)com(slash)igtky--under Fanfics.


	2. Solution

Drabble: a story exactly 100 words long, excluding title.

Thanks to Cadence for showing me how it's done, Zarla for giving me IDEAS, and Jhonen Vasquez for not suing in sheer indignation.

* * *

SOLUTION  
by rueyeet

"You know," Johnny mused, "I think I figured out the problem with Devi."

"Oh?" Edgar inquired, glancing over at him across the tattered sofa.

"Too slow. Perfection lost forever, everything degenerating in mere seconds...simply because I took too long." Johnny stared unseeing at the TV, drumming his fingers thoughtfully.

Edgar hesitated only a moment, long used to choosing his words carefully. "Maybe you didn't give things _enough_ time. Maybe it wasn't really perfect yet."

"Mmmm." Johnny sounded doubtful, then brightened. "Don't worry though. I won't make that mistake next time."

_Well_, Scriabin said, _at least you know it'll be quick_.

* * *

This story can also be found at Zarla's site--www(dot)ashido(dot)com(slash)igtky--under Fanfics.


	3. Passive

Always wanted to try my hand at a songfic. Set to "Passive", from A Perfect Circle's album eMOTIVe.

If you've read "Vargas", you knew Nny would get around to killing Edgar, eventually. This story occurs after Ch. 15 ("Free") of "Vargas" and then my little continuity veers away from there.

Johnny and Edgar appear without the permission, and hopefully without the knowledge, of their original creator, Jhonen Vasquez. Scriabin is Zarla's creation, but I hope neither of them will mind if I borrow him for a bit.

A note about formats: The normal, left-justified italics are Edgar and Scriabin in their never-ending internal conversation. Them's a lot of italics, yep. Originally I had the song lyrics indented, but FFN won't do indents, so they have dashes around them; lyrics in parenthesis are background vocals.

* * *

PASSIVE  
by rueyeet 

_--Dead as dead can be.--_

Consciousness had returned to him very slowly, through a dark haze in which voices, noises, and an insistent beeping swirled together and made no sense. Eventually, he was able to sort out the sounds, and knew that he was in the hospital. He was unable to open his eyes, or to move, or in fact to feel any physical sensations at all. The nurses chattered to each other as they performed the necessary tasks, but he could not tell when they were touching him. He was both worried by this, and grateful for not having to feel the pain he must certainly otherwise be in; but it gave him nothing to do but listen.

"Is there a living will?" he heard one day.

"No. The only next of kin are out of state, some distant relatives, and they refuse for religious reasons."

"Has it been explained to them that he'll never wake again? That it's only the machines keeping him alive? That brain death is, for all intents and purposes, as dead as you can get?"

"Doesn't matter...their faith doesn't permit it."

"Well, at least he had insurance." A door swung open, and thudded shut again.

_--The doctor tells me,  
__But I just can't believe him;  
__Ever the optimistic one.--_

Edgar didn't feel dead. Not healthy and whole, certainly, but he was still here, wasn't he? He felt some irritation at their callous attitude. Living wills were necessary because sometimes people sometimes _did_ wake up, against all expectations and medical prognosis. And all life was sacred, a gift of God. If he ever did recover, he'd have to thank his relatives for sticking to their values.

Of course, that begged the question of exactly how he had ended up in the Intensive Care Unit to begin with.

_Don't tell me you even need to ask._

In his current condition Edgar could not shut his eyes in exasperation, or give a long-suffering groan, so he had to settle for replying. _Where have you been? And why couldn't you have stayed there?_

_Stupid question, Edgar. I'm you, remember? Where you go, I am._

Edgar took a brief moment to wonder how, with the two of them in it, his brain had not managed to register any activity for the doctors. He'd been trapped in his head with Scriabin before, and he still had nightmares about the experience. Being a prisoner in his own body was bad enough, but having to share it with Scriabin was infinitely worse.

_--I'm sure of your ability  
__To become my perfect enemy.--_

_All right, _Edgar said to his invisible companion. _What happened, then? And...why can't I see you like I did before?_

_What happened_--Scriabin's tone veered between the usual sarcastic contempt and outright hostility--_is that your beloved homicidal maniac finally reached the next level in your relationship, and bludgeoned you to death. But since you didn't actually die this time, you'd still need the visual centers of your brain to process images._ _However, your skull is currently sporting several major fractures, and there was severe brain damage. You've been here for weeks, now._ It sounded like an accusation.

Edgar wasn't taking the bait, however. _If it's that bad, then why aren't I dead?_

_Better to ask, if you're not dead, then why is it that bad?_

_What?_

_And you say you're so logical, _Scriabin mocked. _Let me spell it out for you. Johnny told you he couldn't die. The Devil said that his invisibility, if that's the best thing to call it, came from his status as a waste lock. Which you now are._

Edgar was still nonplussed. _Are you saying I can't die either? Even if that's true, so what?_

He was unprepared for the viciousness of the reply, even from Scriabin. _So what the fucking hell are you DOING here?_

_--Wake up and face me  
__Don't play dead--_

_How is this my fault? _Edgar didn't understand. _It's not like there's anything I can do about it!_

_No, there never is, is there? Everything just HAPPENS to you, it's never under YOUR control. Never Edgar's fault, no. _Edgar had heard all of that before, of course, but he had never heard Scriabin sound so agitated, almost frantic. _Your precious Nny wanted you dead, so here you are! Lying here on life support, perfectly willing to waste away to nothing like a good little martyr!_

_What do you think I can do about it?_ Edgar repeated, incredulous. _You think I want to be stuck here with you? If there were something I could do about that, you better believe I would!_

_Don't I just fucking wish, _Scriabin breathed in pure hatred. _You're not afraid of death, oh no. You're afraid to be ALIVE! You make me sick!_

_--Because maybe someday I will walk away and say  
__You disappoint me.  
__Maybe you're better off this way.--_

The sound of the door opening interrupted the argument. Edgar felt a strange small thrill at the familiar sound of oddly-shaped boots that was not, this time, echoed by the flutter of his stomach, or by the quickening of his pulse. The machines continued their monotonous beeping as a chair scraped softly towards the bed.

"Hi." Johnny said softly. "You probably can't hear me, being brain-dead and all, but...well." There was a long, awkward pause.

_Don't worry,_ Scriabin put in nastily. _He wouldn't listen to you anyway. He never listens to me._

_Shut up. I want to hear this._

Edgar sensed Scriabin readying a retort, but Johnny began talking again. "I really wanted to tell you that this is not how I wanted things to turn out. It was all going to be so perfect...and now you're here. You've not alive but you're not dead and...it's just not the way it was supposed to happen...no one should have to be like this..." Edgar could hear the tears in his words.

_Yeah, cry me a fucking river! _Scriabin spat.

"The worst of it is..." Johnny's voice caught in sobs that broke his words into fragments. "It's my fault. I called them. Can you believe it? I called 911. Me, of all people! And...and they actually came. I didn't think they would, but they did. It was supposed to be so perfect, and I captured it, I did! And I froze it like that...and then, and then it was just...cold. Not cold like I wanted to be, before. Not...it...it...hurt."

_No shit, Sherlock. Couldn't have come to this conclusion any sooner, could you?_

_Shut UP!_

"And then I suddenly remembered what you said about time, and not letting other good things happen, and missing out on things because...and now you're not here, and I'll never know, and it's all my fault..." His voice trailed off, but Edgar could tell he was still crying. "God. I feel so...so utterly stupid."

_--Leaning over you here,  
__Cold and catatonic,  
__I catch a brief reflection  
__Of what you could and might have been.--_

Johnny drew a shaking breath, obviously trying to regain relative control of himself. "It's too late now to fix it. I know that. I ruined things, like I always do. But...I can at least do this much. For you." Edgar heard a very slight rustling, then the footsteps nearing the head of the bed.

_Oh, shit. You skinny little bastard, you are NOT going to..._ Edgar was surprised to hear Scriabin's fury mingled with cold fear.

And then he heard the steady beeping and the slow puffing of the respirator abruptly cease.

"Goodbye, Edgar," Johnny whispered. After a long moment, Edgar heard those inimitable footsteps moving away for the last time, and heard the door open. The thud of its closing sounded as loud in his ears as the sealing of a tomb.

_--It's your right and your ability  
__To become my perfect enemy.--_

The sensation was not physical; Edgar could not feel his heart stop beating, could not feel his lungs refuse to draw breath. Still, his damaged brain knew that something had gone disastrously awry, and he was flooded with a strangely unspecific anxiety. Much more painful was the knowledge that Johnny was gone forever. The tenuous, fragile connection that had held them together for so long was finally broken; Johnny's promise to him was finally fulfilled.

Grief gave way to acceptance as Edgar realized that nothing remained to tie him to this world, and he found that he still had no fear of death. After all, he had already died once.

_Wake up, Edgar!_ Scriabin snarled. _You think you're going to Heaven, do you? Guess again! Now, for once in your pointless, wasted life, LISTEN TO ME! Get off your complacent little ass, and LIVE! _

_--Wake up (why can't you) and face me (come on now)  
__Don't play dead, because maybe--_

_I thought you said I couldn't die_, Edgar told him absently. He didn't really believe it, anyway. Scriabin did have one point, though--Edgar figured he had about three minutes to beg God's forgiveness and avoid wandering the dingy streets of Hell for the rest of eternity before his oxygen-starved cells made it a moot point.

_This is NOT the time to test that theory! Damn it, Edgar! You can stop this!_

Ignoring the hated voice, he began to pray. _O my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended Thee, and I detest all my sins, because I dread the loss of heaven, and the pains of hell..._well, that part was certainly true.

_No! Stop it! He doesn't hear you! He doesn't care! It's up to you, it's always been up to you, you idiot! Take the power you've been given and USE it!_

Edgar ignored him, and continued, putting all his sincerity and faith into the words. _...but most of all because they offend Thee, my God, Who art all good and deserving of all my love_... It was becoming more and more difficult to ignore the unpleasant sensation that Edgar supposed was his body's last attempt to survive, which was beginning to feel like being pulled in opposite directions between two enormous and immovable forces.

_I don't believe this. I just do NOT believe this. You're going to DIE, right now, and you don't even care! You pusillanimous wretch, how COULD you?_ The scream of fury was now laced with despair.

_--Someday I will walk away and say  
__You disappoint me.  
__Maybe you're better off this way.--_

With effort, Edgar focused past Scriabin's voice, past the growing pain, and finished his prayer. _I firmly resolve, with the help of Thy grace, to confess my sins, to do penance, and to amend my life._ Almost there. His soul, tethered to his body by unseen bonds even as it tried to flee, felt stretched to the breaking point.

_This IS your life, Edgar! Do something! Don't just give up, damn you!_

With great satisfaction, Edgar said succinctly, _No._ And then, with relief, _Amen._ He felt something give, felt the unbearable tension lessen.

From Scriabin, there was only stunned silence for a long moment, then Edgar heard him say grimly, _Fine._

_--...maybe you're better off this way.  
__You're better off this...maybe you're better off!--_

Once again, Edgar saw the line of a distant horizon resolve itself out of the darkness of his vision, and he strained towards it. He saw his hand reaching longingly for that faraway sky--and at the same time, felt himself yanked forcibly back. As best he could, he twisted his head back over his shoulder to see what kept him from his goal, and met Scriabin's wrathful glare. Behind him, the black of his trenchcoat attenuated itself into strands that faded back into the impenetrable blackness, an echo of the white bonds Edgar remembered so well.

"Fine." Scriabin said again, his voice hard. "If you won't do anything, then I will. Maybe you're willing to give up on living, to go wherever they send you, but I'm not."

_--Wake up (why can't you) and face me (come on now)  
__Don't play dead, because maybe someday I will walk away and say--_

"You didn't have to be lying there in that hospital, you know." Scriabin was speaking very fast, and holding very tightly to him, despite Edgar's struggles. "Remember when Johnny asked you to kill him? And he took who knows how much voltage, and just got up again, right as rain. It isn't just invisibility...you can be invulnerable! They need you as a shit-collector, so the world is not allowed to let you die."

"Then why am I dying? Why won't you let me go?" Edgar kicked backwards, writhing, but he could not break Scriabin's vise-like grip.

"You're dying because you won't let yourself LIVE, Edgar! And you're taking me with you, you selfish bastard! I won't let you do this! You're so happy to hand your life over to your psychopathic lover, to your indifferent God, well, you hand it over to ME! Because I am NOT going to let you drag me down with you!"

_--You fucking disappoint me!  
__Maybe you're better off this way!--_

"He was not my lover! He killed me, it's over, there's nothing...Now let me GO!"

"No!" Scriabin hissed in his ear. "Give it to me!"

_--Go ahead and play dead (go)  
__I know that you can hear this (go)  
__Go ahead and play dead (go)--_

In a haze of desperation and anger, Edgar tried to fight, tried to claw his way forwards towards the angels and the clouds, away from the darkness that led back to the world, to life. There was nothing for him there, nothing he wanted. There never had been anything he wanted. Except for a little while, and now that was gone, too. There was only one thing left, and that was right in front of him. What did Scriabin want from him, anyway?

"Give it up, Edgar! You always give up, why can't you give up now! Your own fucking God damn you, you are NOT dying on me!"

_--Why can't you turn and face me (wake up)  
__Why can't you turn and face me (wake up)  
__Why can't you turn and face me (wake up)--_

Clinging to him tenaciously, Scriabin dragged Edgar backwards, inch by inch, both of them panting with exertion. Anguished, Edgar watched the horizon fade, dimming slowly away. Why couldn't Scriabin understand? There was nothing he wanted back there, he was tired of all of it, he wanted nothing, he wanted...he wanted...nothing.

He was just so tired. He wanted nothing, wanted it with all his being.

He let go, closed his eyes, and allowed the blackness to claim him.

_--Why can't you turn and face me? (...you!)  
__You fucking disappoint me!--_

When the nurse came into the room a while later to check on him and take care of the usual necessities, she was surprised to find the supposedly brain-dead patient sitting up in bed, glaring at his own hands as if they offended him. The life-support machines were silent. "Oh! You're...you're awake!"

He looked up, and smiled strangely at her. "Yes. Finally."

As the nurse left the room, calling excitedly to the doctors to come see the miraculous recovery, Scriabin scowled. In his head there was nothing but stubborn silence.

_--Passive aggressive bullshit  
__Passive aggressive bullshit...--_

* * *

This story can also be found at Zarla's site--www(dot)ashido(dot)com(slash)igtky--under Fanfics. 


	4. Reset

This is the follow-up to "Passive", which diverges from Zarla's "Vargas" continuity after Ch 14 ("Truth"), and continues blithely on as if oblivious of everything that followed.

As ever, apologies to Jhonen Vasquez for the misappropriation of Johnny C. and Edgar Vargas. And many thanks to Zarla for allowing me to toy with Scriabin.

* * *

RESET  
by rueyeet

Scriabin's patience was wearing thin.

It wasn't as if he was unaccustomed to the feeling, but this was a bit much, even for him. As entertaining as it was to have complete control of Edgar's physical form, the novelty was beginning to wear off.

After the miraculous recovery from Johnny's dual attempts at tenderest murder had forced him to take charge, Scriabin had amused himself for several months by doing any number of things that Edgar would never do. He had talked back to Edgar's boss, begun a campaign to undermine the poor man's authority with well-placed comments to his subordinates, and flouted his intellectual superiority over Edgar's co-workers at the water cooler. He had cut people off in traffic and flagrantly disregarded the speed limit at every opportunity. He'd flirted devilishly with anyone that caught his eye, at one point carrying on no fewer than three affairs at once. He'd grown out his hair, updated Edgar's bland wardrobe, and had his ear pierced. Anyone who had known Edgar--even peripherally--wondered at the change, seeing him in a whole new light.

Even better, he'd found that the immunity to consequences that Johnny had formerly enjoyed worked to his advantage. It was as if whatever authority sustained the waste-lock system was just as happy if their charges collected the wretched detritus of humanity by actively creating it as they were when someone simply acted as a passive channel. Scriabin found that both very interesting, and quite agreeable.

Through it all, Edgar had remained obstinately, frustratingly silent.

Scriabin knew he was still in there somewhere, nursing the hurt inflicted by the dissolution of his self-destructive relationship even as he hid from it. But nothing Scriabin did seemed to break through Edgar's miserable isolation. He wasn't even sure Edgar was aware of his actions. All Scriabin knew was that it irritated him to no end.

More than that, though, he knew that this wasn't really what he wanted. Sealed off within that tiny corner of his own mind, Edgar was safe, protected from anything Scriabin could do to reach him. It was an unoriginal, but highly effective, method of self-preservation. Scriabin, who prided himself on seeing through Edgar's many self-deceptions, had to admit to himself that possession of Edgar's body wasn't the same thing at all as having Edgar himself.

It was time to up the ante. He'd miss being able to act freely, miss being more than an observer, but it couldn't be helped for now. Someday, he'd have his victory, and there would be time enough to indulge himself then.

Scriabin had, most sensibly in his opinion, stayed well away from Johnny; the evening news was proof enough that the killings continued unabated. Some risk would be involved, to be sure, but Edgar could not be allowed to continue to evade him. Having made up his mind to force the issue, he put his plan into action immediately. He hopped into Edgar's car, drove to Johnny's house, and knocked smartly on the door.

After a minute or two, the door opened. Scriabin watched as Johnny's expression changed from wary annoyance to wide-eyed astonishment. A past master at hiding his true motivations, Scriabin stifled his laughter at how utterly priceless the look on Johnny's face was as he choked out, "Edgar...you...you're...alive!"

Solemnly, Scriabin agreed, "Yeah...it's a long story. Can I come in?"

Wordlessly, still staring, Johnny held the door open for him. Scriabin entered the house, gazing around with every appearance of misty-eyed sentimentality, while taking note of the many places where weapons had been carelessly strewn about. Coming to stand in the center of the room, he turned to face Johnny, who had shut the door and put his back to it, holding tightly to himself as if in defense.

"You look...different," said Johnny weakly, not meeting his eyes. "Your clothes, they're...your hair's longer."

"It's been awhile." Scriabin kept his voice quiet, level. It wouldn't do to tip his hand too soon.

"But how? You died! I was there, I..." Johnny looked up, guilt and hurt vying in his eyes. "I _killed_ you. I made sure! How is this possible?"

"Do you remember when you asked me to kill you, that time? You said you didn't think you could die. I don't think I can either, anymore."

There was a pause as the implications of that sunk in. Stricken, Johnny asked, "Are you sure?"

Scriabin held back the sarcasm with some effort. "Pretty sure, yes."

Johnny pushed off from the door, pacing agitatedly around the room. "God...you're probably right. Do you think that it's because of the waste lock thing? That whoever they pile their shit onto can't even fucking slit their wrists to get out of it? That once you're stuck with it, they don't let you go until you're too far gone for it to even work anymore? Who came up with this sick joke of a system, why--"

"Well, it is the most logical explanation," Scriabin said, cutting into what promised to become another fine rant on the myriad evils of the world. He couldn't quite keep the irony from his tone, but Johnny didn't seem to notice. He stopped in front of Scriabin, arms crossed again.

"Why did you come back?" His voice was sharp with pain.

A dozen comebacks to that rose easily to Scriabin's mind. _Because I'm an idiot? A doormat? A wall? Because I have no sense of self-preservation? Hey, I liked dying so much I thought I'd try it again!_ Luckily, the time it took to get himself under control was no longer than the time it usually took Edgar to choose his words. "Where else would I go?" He shrugged, and took a single step towards Johnny. "You're the only one who ever cared whether I was dead or alive."

Johnny backed up a step, his tone turning defensive. "Why now? If you were going to come back, why wait?"

"I...didn't know how you'd take my being alive. Whether that would ruin your...memory of me." Scriabin took another step forward, holding out his hands. "But, Nny, you're all I have. I...I missed you." He only just managed not to choke on the words.

"You _missed_ me. You missed _me_?" Johnny looked at him disbelievingly, but there was longing there too. "I've hurt you, I've always hurt you...I _killed_ you, Edgar--"

"Yes, for perfection. You thought you knew when that moment was, but you were wrong..." Scriabin moved closer, holding Johnny's gaze with his own, his outstretched hands not quite touching him. He let his voice become low and intense. "Nny. You can't kill me, now. But I'm here; I'm here for you. Do you want to know how far perfection can truly go?"

They were only inches apart. Scriabin dared to lay his hands on the thin arms, and breathed, "Do you want me to show you?"

..._no. stop._ The voice in his head was faint, but it was there. He breathed a private, internal sigh of relief.

_Make me!_ he threw back.

For a split second Johnny hesitated, wavering, then shoved him violently away. "No! Edgar wouldn't say that. Edgar wouldn't be doing this." His eyes flashed, and he lunged forwards, grabbing Scriabin by the front of his coat and shaking him furiously. "Who are you? Where is Edgar?"

"Oh, so you're okay with touching me as long as it's to hurt me, hmmm?" He saw the remark hit home. With one swift gesture, Scriabin brought his own hands up between Johnny's and outwards, breaking his hold.

Johnny backed quickly away, narrowing his eyes in a murderous glare, his hand straying near the wickedly long knife lying on a table. "You're not Edgar," he stated with flat certainty. "Who are you?"

_Might as well_. "Technically speaking, I _am_ Edgar. But Edgar, overly simplistic thing that he is, likes to call me Scriabin."

"Like the action figure?" Johnny blinked, then tilted his head to the side and eyed him shrewdly. "Then--you're the one he talks to when he's not talking to me."

"Very perceptive. Speaking from experience, are we?"

Johnny ignored that, fixing him with one of those intense stares, and Scriabin judged it prudent to stroll nonchalantly towards where he'd seen the Taser on the floor. The knife abruptly made its appearance in Johnny's hand and was pointed in his direction. "You aren't really Edgar's anymore, though, are you?"

Scriabin paused, surprised. Clearly, he must not discount the intelligence of which Edgar was so fond by focusing on the insanity that Edgar tried so hard to overlook. _Crazy, not stupid..._He halted as one boot came in contact with black plastic and snorted derisively. "I'm sure he'd love to think so."

With deceptively casual ease, Johnny twirled the knife in his hand. "Is he still there? Or is it just you, now?"

"Oh, he's there. Hasn't said a word since you pulled the plug on him, though." He gave a dramatically mocking sigh. "Poor Edgar. I don't think he took being dumped so well."

"Dumped." The knife stopped spinning in a suddenly white-knuckled hand as the pain reappeared in Johnny's eyes. "God, you're an asshole. How the hell does Edgar put up with you?"

"Badly, I'm afraid. Nevertheless, here I am. Reduced to playing Cyrano to Edgar's Christian, so to speak, and so I ask: What do you care?" In plain view, Scriabin scooped up the Taser from the floor, then clasped his hands behind his back and walked slowly back towards Johnny. "He loves you, you know. He really does. What about you? Are you even capable of that?"

Johnny looked away, hugging the knife to himself, and did not reply.

_stop it. Don't._

_Don't what? Tell him the truth?_

"Would you take him back?" Scriabin challenged.

"It's not like that...not like the way you're talking about it." Johnny shook his head vehemently, visibly trembling, and his voice dropped to little more than a whisper. "Besides...he'd never be able to forgive me."

Scriabin, sensing his advantage, closed in. His voice was hard and cruel. "Why not? He seems to have a thing for assholes. I think he must like the abuse."

Johnny's head snapped up, his eyes mad with hate and guilt and rage, and he leapt snarling for Scriabin, the knife raised. Scriabin dodged the strike and whipped the Taser around, hitting Johnny in the side. He released the button as soon as the knife dropped from nerveless fingers. After all, Johnny was no use to him dead. As the maniac stumbled twitching to the floor, Scriabin threw the Taser away and dove for the knife. Before Johnny could come to, he knelt beside him, hauled him up by the hair, and put the knife to his throat.

_Now, Edgar, you and I are going to have a little talk._ Scriabin watched Johnny's eyes flutter open. With consciousness came comprehension, and the thin body tensed next to his. "Don't even think about it," Scriabin warned, seeing him look about for something he could use as a weapon. "You're not the protected one anymore, remember?"

_What are you doing?_ Edgar's voice was clearer. _Let him go!_

"Let me go," Johnny ground out through clenched teeth at the same moment.

"Make me," Scriabin repeated. "God, you two really are the perfect pair. In this corner, we have Edgar 'I'm-not-lonely' Vargas, burying every scrap of true feeling under logic and rationalization and flat-out lies! And over here, we have the notorious Johnny C., so afraid of his emotions that he'd rather tear everything down than even make the attempt! Watch in amazement as both of them see who can go to the greatest lengths to avoid the issue! Watch them in their never-ending waltz around the point--" His tirade was cut short as Johnny twisted in his grip, kicking out wildly. Hands closed around his wrist, trying to force the knife away.

Scriabin let go of Johnny's hair. "Now, now. We wouldn't want to damage poor Edgar, now would we?" Matter-of-factly, he backhanded Johnny across the face, knocking him back to the floor, then pinned him there with a knee to the chest. Slowly, carefully, he leaned in, letting his weight dig the knifepoint into Johnny's skin until blood trickled down from the blade. Johnny hissed in pain and lay still, glaring up at him with eyes slitted in hatred.

_No! Why are you doing this? You have control, just like you always wanted, you can do anything you want now! Don't hurt him...leave me alone..._

"Oh, so now we come to the truth! It's all about you, isn't it? All along, both of you have just been using each other for your selfish needs! You never really cared in the slightest! Which is, of course, why you're so upset about this now." He shook Johnny slightly. "And you! So in love with your lofty ideal of perfection--did you ever really see Edgar at all? Or was it just 'so long, and thanks for the memories?'"

Johnny's angry gaze faltered, and he shut his eyes against Scriabin's words.

_That's not fair, it's not true! Damn you, Scriabin, what do you want?_

"All right, here's the deal, and I don't care if either one of you likes it." Scriabin drew a deep breath. He hoped he had read each of them correctly, but Edgar had a distressing habit of surprising him. And Johnny, of course, was chaos incarnate. "Either you stop me, Edgar, or I am going to slit your precious little Nny's throat right here and now, and walk off with your body without a backward glance, and you can just stay there in your warm cocoon of cozy denial and forever hold your peace. Or you can take responsibility for once in your life, and be reunited with your beloved psychopath. And Nny here can admit that nothing in life is perfect, and be willing to deal with things as they come, because you can't martyr yourself for him now. All you have to do--both of you--is admit that you care! Why is that so fucking hard?"

For a long moment, no one spoke.

Scriabin waited with growing frustration. Could he have misjudged them both so completely?

Finally, amazingly, it was Johnny who broke the silence with one quiet word. "Edgar." It was neither a plea, nor a reprimand; neither a cry for mercy, nor a shout of rage. Johnny simply looked straight into his eyes, past Scriabin, and called his name.

_Nny_, Edgar whispered back, and reached for the knife, answering that call.

There was a second or two of disorientation, and Edgar found himself once more looking out through his own eyes, into Johnny's. He gave a small yelp as he became aware that he was still holding the bloody knife, and threw it far across the room.

"God, I'm sorry, I had no idea he would do that, I had no idea you would be in any danger, Nny, please forgive me..." Edgar knew he was babbling, but he didn't seem to be able to stop. "I wouldn't have come back, I'd never have ruined this for you, I..."

Johnny studied his face very closely before he shook his head, waving away Edgar's explanations. "No. I had already ruined it. It's what I do." He gave a small, sad smile. "...Let me up?"

Edgar jumped slightly as he realized that he still held Johnny pinned to the floor. Getting shakily to his feet, Edgar offered him a hand, and a thrill of surprise ran through him when it was accepted without hesitation. Johnny pulled himself up, ignoring the blood that dribbled down his neck, and did not let go of Edgar's hand. Slowly, he brought both of their hands up between them, clasped palm to palm, as they had been that night in Edgar's room.

They stood like that for a long time.

"Now what?" Edgar wondered at Johnny's apparent calm. His own heart was beating very fast.

"I don't know," Johnny confessed soberly, then that sudden smile reappeared. "There's one thing you can do, though." Edgar looked back at him, perplexed.

Johnny ducked his head in an oddly shy gesture, but his glance was sharp. "Get a haircut."

* * *

This story can also be found at Zarla's site--www(dot)ashido(dot)com(slash)igtky--under Fanfics.


	5. Stay

Drabble: a story exactly 100 words long, excluding title. Someday I'll have written enough to not say that this is my sixth completed story.

This was inspired by all of Zarla's pictures of Nny sleeping while Edgar reads. Thanks once again to Cadence, drabbler extraordinaire, and apologies to original creator Jhonen Vasquez.

* * *

STAY  
by rueyeet

"Edgar." Johnny's voice was hollow with exhuastion. "Do something for me?"

"Anything."

_Liar._

"Stay with me while I sleep. Be there when I wake up. I can't fight it off much longer, I can feel it. You know how I hate waking up and never knowing if anything's _real_...but maybe if I had a way to connect before and after, something permanent..."

Edgar understood, and was touched. "Of course."

_Edgar, guardian angel of mass muderers._ Scriabin snickered.

Johnny caught the momentary wince. "Oh, and Edgar?"

"Yes?"

"Tell Scriabin to shut up," he said coolly, curling up and closing his eyes.

* * *

This story can also be found at Zarla's site--www(dot)ashido(dot)com(slash)igtky--under Fanfics.


	6. Back

Follow-up to Reset. Once again I betray my fascination for other people's belongings, as Edgar tries to make sense of the impact of Scriabin's hijacking of his life. I giggled a lot when writing this, because I am mean.

As usual, Edgar is the sadly neglected brainchild of Jhonen Vasquez, who is also responsible for Johnny. Scriabin is Zarla's.

* * *

BACK  
by rueyeet

Edgar ascended the stairs to his small apartment in a slight haze of unreality. When Johnny had told him that it had been months since he had gone into the hospital, it had sounded far-fetched, impossible. He hadn't had any sense of time, hidden away inside his mind, but surely it couldn't have been that long.

As he had walked to his car after he and Johnny had awkwardly bid each other good night, though, he'd felt the unmistakable chill in the air that meant winter was coming. When he had last come up the cracked walk that crossed that patchy lawn, the humidity of summer had lingered in the blueness of the evening. He shivered and clutched his coat more tightly around him before he realized that he was wearing it.

Johnny watched him from the doorway until he pulled away from the curb, instead of shutting the door immediately as he usually did. Edgar drove home, something he couldn't place nagging at the edge of his consciousness. The lot adjacent to his building was full, and he had to park on the street, more than a block away. Swearing slightly under his breath, he shoved his hands in his pockets and trudged back along the street through a quiet broken only by the woosh of cars passing, or a dog barking in the distance. Suddenly he placed the odd feeling of something missing: there were no insect sounds. It was too late in the year even for the last few crickets.

Somehow he had expected his apartment to have an air of neglect, to feel deserted, but as he walked in and flipped on the lights, he was greeted by warmth and the smell of recent cooking. Of course. Scriabin had been living here, hadn't he?

Edgar stopped dead in the middle of his living room as that sunk in. Scriabin had been living in his apartment, wearing his clothes, driving his car, working at his job.

In effect, Scriabin had taken over his life.

Suddenly feeling unreasonably like an intruder in his own home, Edgar slowly removed his coat and looked around.

Edgar had always prided himself in taking some thought and care for his surroundings. Not an unseemly amount--no one would ever mistake him for an interior designer--but he wasn't one of those men who were waiting for a woman to put curtains on their windows and pick up after them. He'd made sure that things matched, that everything was tidy. A place for everything, and everything in its place.

Now, however, vibrant color intruded on the soothing neutrals: plump velvety pillows in the deep red of fine wine blurred the clean contemporary lines of his couch. The painting on the most prominent wall had been replaced with a large piece of modern art, lines of rusty red, forest green, sky blue, and black wriggling hyperactively against a mustard-gold background. On the bookshelf, a tiny but expensive-looking stereo was accompanied by a stack of CDs, an eclectic pile of jazz piano and rock and classical. Several of the small decorative items had been replaced with peculiar, idiosyncratic pieces. Edgar sat down in an oddly-shaped chair, its cinnamon red echoing the painting and the pillows. It was more comfortable than it looked.

If his home before had resembled the pages of a catalog, carefully color-coordinated, it now looked like the crew of one of those budget home-makeover shows had been through it, giddily tossing around bright hues and offbeat decor. Edgar had to admit that the overall effect wasn't exactly disagreeable, but it just didn't feel right to him. On top of that, there were things strewn all across the coffee table--magazines he'd never subscribed to, assorted mail, a CD case, and a book or two.

Struck by a sudden thought, he got up and went to look in the kitchen. The smell of cooking was stronger here. There was something in it that Edgar didn't immediately recognize, and he looked around. Had he always had curry in his spice rack? Or chili powder? He couldn't remember buying such things. He was almost disappointed to lose his private bet when he saw that the sink was not, after all, full of dirty dishes.

_Don't worry, I'm no slob. _Scriabin sounded highly amused. _We're not complete opposites, you know._

"You certainly made yourself at home, didn't you?" Edgar didn't even try to keep the resentment out of his voice.

_What? Does it bother you that it looks like someone actually lives here, now? Or are you just pissed off because that someone isn't you?_

Edgar had no answer to that.

Realizing that he still wore his coat, he headed back to the bedroom to hang it up. Everything there seemed much the same until he opened the closet. More color assailed his eyes, rich reds and olive greens and French blues sprinkled with the occasional darker piece. A quick look through the drawers yielded much the same results. It didn't look like Scriabin had actually thrown anything away, though.

Edgar held up a black shirt. "You realize I'm not going to wear this stuff."

_Why not? A bit of black gives things kick. Like a little pepper in a dish._

Realizing that he hadn't physically heard Scriabin's voice as he usually could when he was near enough, he looked on the desk by his bed, next to the clock. The action figure was gone.

"Where--?"

_You don't think I had any use for that thing, do you?_ came the scornful reply.

"Where did you put it, Scriabin? Where are you?"

_Right in your head, where I've always been. _There was a slight edge to the words. _Poor Edgar, can't sleep without his widdle toy by his bedside. Have you considered maybe a teddy bear?_

"Keep your friends close, your enemies closer," Edgar threw back. "I bet you couldn't throw it out, could you? Where did you--where did you put you, Scriabin?" It sounded odd even as he said it, but he couldn't think of any other way to put it.

There was a sigh before Scriabin replied. _I wouldn't get rid of anything you really thought was important. That's why there was so much I could change. It's here somewhere, I don't remember where._

Edgar began to look, pulling open various drawers with no success. As he straightened up to search elsewhere, he glanced up, into the mirror over the dresser--and gave a small startled yelp. For a horrible second, he couldn't tell if it was Scriabin he was looking at, or himself. Only the look in the eyes of his reflection, surprise and fright, reassured him that he was the one in the mirror. His hair hung down around his face, almost as long as Scriabin's had been when he'd first seen him inside the whitespace of his mind. Now he knew why Johnny had told him to get a haircut. Edgar ran his hands through the mess of wayward strands, pulling it back as if he could make it disappear that way, and caught the flash of silver at his ear.

He stared a moment in shock, then yelled, "What have you DONE?"

_I've been living in your body all this time, and you're worried about an earring? _Scriabin said sardonically. _Priorities, Edgar. Keep your voice down, the neighbors will think you've lost it._

He took hold of the small silvery beaded ring, intending to take it out, but it was solid, and he couldn't figure out how it came off.

_You're not supposed to take it out until it's healed, anyway--it could get infected. Better get to bed. You have to work tomorrow._

Edgar stood, clenching his fists impotently. How dare Scriabin make permanent changes to his--Edgar's--own body? Furniture, decorations, clothes could all be easily discarded, set to rights. But this--even if he could figure out how to get the damn thing out, it would probably leave a scar, however small.

How dare he? And what else had Scriabin done?

Uneasily, Edgar set about getting ready for bed. The routine soothed him, as long as he didn't look in the mirror for too long. As he pulled back the covers, he felt better. If he could just get back into the routine of things, surely he could purge his life of Scriabin's little changes, and then everything would be normal again. Ignoring the amusement he could faintly sense inside his head, he resolutely shut his eyes. It occurred to him that he still hadn't found Scriabin, but he told himself there'd be time to look for him later.

After several hours of tossing and turning, Edgar turned on the light, put on his glasses, and resumed his search. Eventually he found the small plastic toy standing in front of the boxes piled on the top shelf of the hall closet. He returned to his bedroom, clutching the action figure, and restored Scriabin to his rightful place on the desk.

_Sometimes, Edgar, you are just the living end._ Scriabin's voice carried more hostility than sarcasm, but Edgar was too tired to wonder why. Pulling the covers around him again, he fell asleep almost immediately.

Feeling much better for a good night's rest, Edgar put aside the strangeness he saw in the mirror by adding a lunch-hour haircut to his mental to-do list. If he picked up lunch on the way, he could deal with the state of his kitchen later. Edgar threw on a jacket instead of the familiar trenchcoat, and closed the door behind him, humming absently.

His improved mood lasted until he walked into the maze of cubicles in which he and his co-workers spent their days.

"Hey, Edgar!"

Edgar looked up, startled, as one of his co-workers emerged to slap his arm in greeting. "Um...hello," he managed awkwardly. He searched his memories of office parties and all-hands meetings, but couldn't remember the man's name. _Scriabin?_ he asked hopefully.

_Oh, no. You're on your own here. It's not my fault you've worked with these people--how many years, now?--and you haven't even bothered to learn half their names._

"So, how'd it go?" his colleague was saying eagerly.

"Oh, you know, fine," mumbled Edgar, just wanting to get away, back to his own little enclosure, his own familiar desk.

"Well? Did you get her phone number?"

"What?" Edgar looked at him blankly for a second before he could come up with a reply. "Oh...her. Uh, no."

The other man gave him a closer look, concerned. "You okay, man?"

"Sure. Yeah. I'm fine. Gotta get going." Edgar tried to sound casual and started to move away.

"Yeah, well, talk to you later." After a last perplexed look, his co-worker disappeared behind the grey partition.

Edgar walked down the hall, keeping his gaze right in front of him. Whatever equilibrium he had managed to regain was rapidly vanishing. He made it safely to his own small grey-walled space, and tried to fall back into his familiar routine, but his inbox was full of requests and projects he didn't remember. Fortunately, Scriabin was inclined to help him catch up.

_Oh, so now you decide to be helpful?_

_It's no good to either of us if you lose your job, boring as it may be._

With Scriabin's assistance, Edgar sorted through the mess, trying his best to keep from speaking his side of the conversation out loud. Getting back into the swing of things wasn't as difficult as he thought. He'd been expecting to be further behind, but Scriabin had indeed kept up with Edgar's work quite adequately.

Their progress was interrupted by one of the women from another department, who came and stood behind his chair without being invited. She looked upset. Edgar didn't remember her name, either.

"Edgar, we have to talk."

That was never a good thing to hear from anyone. Edgar fumbled for words, mentally cursing Scriabin's sudden silence. "Talk...um, yeah. Sure. What do you want to talk about?"

"As if you didn't know!" she said angrily, keeping her voice pitched low enough not to reach beyond his cubicle. "How you say such a thing? I--"

She fell abruptly silent, eyes flicking towards the hallway, and assumed a carefully neutral expression as Edgar's manager poked his head around the partition. "I'll get back to you about that, okay, Edgar?" She laid her hand on his back for a second, with more than casual pressure, then left. Edgar hid his dismay and confusion, and turned towards his manager, who was watching him with a wariness he'd never seen from him before.

"Yes?" Edgar kept his face as blank as he could.

"Staff meeting at three. Just a reminder."

Edgar nodded. His manager watched him a moment longer through narrowed eyes, as if unsure what to make of his response, then moved off. Expelling a breath he had been unaware of holding, Edgar dropped his head into his hands. He had never mingled much at work, not wanting to become involved in the small dramas and interpersonal politics that arose in any office. All along, he had tried to just stay under the radar, blend in, and get along. He ought to have known that Scriabin wouldn't have left well enough alone. Now Edgar didn't know what to expect from anyone. What had Scriabin gotten him into?

_Scriabin? What did you do to that poor woman?_

_Nothing, _Scriabin replied airily. _I made no promises whatsoever._

Thoroughly unsettled, Edgar returned to clearing out his inbox. In his perturbed state of mind, he forgot about his haircut, and worked straight through lunch. Eventually, his computer chimed a soft reminder of the weekly staff meeting, and he picked up notepad and pen and headed for the conference room. Avoiding everyone's eyes, he sat down at the far end of the table and listened with half his mind as his manager droned through project status and administrative details and policy announcements, doodling distractedly on his notepad. The few times Edgar raised his eyes, someone always seemed to be looking at him. Their glances varied between curiosity, speculation, and even hostility. Edgar began to feel more and more like everything was slipping away, changed beyond his recognition. How could he find his way back to anything familiar, to territory that he knew?

"...So if you'll all have your surveys in by the end of this week, that would be great. Anyone have anything else?" The manager gave a cursory look around the table, expecting the usual quiet demurrals of people eager to get on with their day.

Surprising everyone, including himself, Edgar stood up. "Yes...actually, I do." All eyes went to him, and he searched briefly for the right words. "I have...sort of a personal announcement to make. Some of you may know that a while ago, I was in the hospital for a few weeks. Well, the truth is, I almost died. It was a miracle that I didn't, really. Over the last few months, I know my behavior has been...a little strange. I want everyone to know that I've been trying to work through this whole brush-with-death thing, and I just haven't been myself lately. If I have said or done anything that anyone was uncomfortable with, anything that wasn't part of a proper work environment, I completely apologize. I've got things much more under control now, and it shouldn't be a problem anymore."

He took a deep breath in the sudden silence as everyone stared at him in astonishment.

_Well, I'll be._ Even Scriabin sounded amazed.

Edgar's manager blinked twice, then found his tongue. "Yes, well, thank you for that, Edgar. Nice to know you're feeling, um, more like yourself." He picked up his stack of papers. "Well, if that's it, then..."

As everyone got up to leave, Edgar turned and walked back to his desk, not wanting to talk about it further to anyone. Before too long, though, his friend from that morning stuck his head around the partition. "Hey, Edgar, got a minute?"

"Sure," Edgar said wearily, and the man came in and leaned against the file cabinet behind Edgar's chair.

"When you said you weren't yourself back there, you, uh...you didn't mean that literally, did you?" He covered his unease with a nervous chuckle.

_Careful, I think he's onto you,_ laughed Scriabin.

Edgar tried to not to show his sudden panic, and asked as casually as he could, "Why would you say that?"

"Well...this is going to sound crazy, but..." The other man studied Edgar, genuinely concerned, and shook his head. "It's just that...it's like I'm talking to a completely different person than I was yesterday." Seeing the look on Edgar's face, he quickly amended, "Yeah, I know, sounds completely nuts. I just wanted to say, y'know, if you're having a rough time, and you need help, or somebody to talk to..." He trailed off awkwardly.

Edgar was quiet a moment, surprised and touched. "Thanks. But I'll be okay, really."

"Okay, well, you know where to find me." He got up, putting a momentary hand on Edgar's shoulder, and left.

Edgar had barely a moment to wonder if maybe he hadn't kept himself a little too apart from his co-workers before the woman from earlier that day swept back into his cubicle.

"I heard about your little announcement. Very convenient." She put her hands on her hips, eyes flashing dangerously.

Feeling a headache coming on, Edgar closed his eyes for a second. "Look. I said that I'm completely sorry for whatever it is that I've done, okay? Can't we just--"

"Whatever you've done? How can you just act like nothing happened?" She stopped and stared at him, incredulous comprehension dawning. "You don't remember. You actually don't remember...do you?"

Edgar looked back at her with weary helplessness. He didn't know what else to say. "No. I'm sorry. I really don't."

She looked at him for a minute longer before she stated flatly, "You need help." Her mouth curled in disgust, and she turned to leave.

Help? Did she mean professional help? Edgar suddenly saw himself from an outsider's perspective, and realized what he would tell someone whose personality shifted so radically; knew the advice he would give to someone who confessed to hearing voices. "Wait...what did you want to talk about? Maybe I can--"

She looked back at him, letting out a short sound that wasn't really laughter. "Save it. I just thought you might like to know that I'm not pregnant." And with that, she marched off.

Pregnant.

The word resonated in Edgar's skull for a full minute before he could bear to grasp the implications. It took another minute for him to find words.

_You slept with her._ It wasn't a question.

_I did,_ replied Scriabin evenly. _Why not? _

_Why not?_ echoed Edgar. _Because you shouldn't have, that's why!_

_Oh, come on, Edgar. Did you think I'd settle for being chaste and pure like you? _His voice took on its accustomed mocking scorn. _Or were you thinking I'd be faithful to you, that you'd be all I could ever want or need?_

Edgar swore out loud before he could stop himself. _Damn it, Scriabin, that's MY body you were so--so--cavalier with! How DARE you?_

_Oh, for heaven's sake, Edgar!_ Scriabin snapped._ I was careful, or haven't you looked in your medicine cabinet lately? Or your wallet, for that matter? And as to whose body it is--you gave it to me! You gave up, you gave me your life! How _dare _you pass judgment on how I chose to live it!_

As Scriabin spoke, Edgar reached for his wallet and opened it, rifled through. Tucked into the billfold was not one condom, but two. Edgar was not the sort of man who carried condoms in his wallet, and had never thought much of the sort of man who did. Almost too furious to think, he managed to coherently form two words.

_How many?_

Scriabin matched his anger. _What the fuck does it matter?_

Edgar was adamant. _How many, Scriabin?_

Silence.

_You fucking BASTARD--_ Edgar felt his blood pressure rising along with his mental voice.

_I'm counting! Christ, Edgar! _Scriabin paused again while Edgar seethed. _About ten, I guess. Give or take._

_Ten. _Edgar's voice became level as white-hot fury exploded into a strangely frozen calm. _You used me to have sex with ten women. Tell me, were they all my co-workers? Can I expect more of these little scenes?_

_No, they weren't all your co-workers. I learned that lesson pretty fast, thank you. Give me _some _credit._ Scriabin's spiteful tone turned to smug, hateful satisfaction. _Oh, and by the way--they weren't all women, either._

Edgar sat there, staring at his computer screen, until the urge to scream had subsided enough to let him turn the computer off, put on his jacket, and leave the office with a reasonable semblance of normality. By the time he had driven home and walked back from another parking space out on the street, he had managed to return his heartbeat and breathing to their usual rates. Ignoring the additions to his apartment, he threw his jacket on the couch and went straight to his file drawer, rooting through it until he found the provider directory for his company's mental health plan. Sitting on his bed, he went through it and wrote down the information for several of the most conveniently located psychologists.

"What do you think you're doing?" Scriabin's amusement still carried an undercurrent of anger.

"What do you think?" Edgar replied, glaring at the action figure. "I'm going to get rid of you, you stinking bastard, and since I can't seem to do it myself, I'm finally going to do what I should have done all along--I'm calling in a professional."

There was a long pause before Scriabin answered him. "We're way past the point where that would have worked, Edgar. It's not that simple anymore."

"We'll see," Edgar ground out through gritted teeth. He picked up the action figure, took it back to the closet, and tossed it into a box of old junk. Then he went back to his bedroom, picked up the phone, and called the first number on his list.

_Yes, Edgar._ The voice spoke softly in his head as the first couple rings came back over the phone line. _We'll see._

* * *

This story can also be found at Zarla's site--www(dot)ashido(dot)com(slash)igtky--under Fanfics. 


	7. Under

Edgar and Johnny appear, as always, completely without the knowledge or consent of their creator Jhonen Vasquez. Scriabin is the unholy creation of Zarla, author of "Vargas", on which this is based. Edgar's backstory here is based on Zarla's random fanart. (Strangely, this was written before I saw her yarn story, for anyone who's seen that.)

It will be obvious to anyone with any real knowledge of psychiatry that I'm working from popular preconceptions here much more than facts. This story is in NO way meant to present a clinical picture of, or to trivialize, DID/MPD; nor is it my intention to insult, belittle, or offend anyone who has been diagnosed with this condition.

* * *

UNDER  
by rueyeet

"You can go in now, Mr. Vargas."

The receptionist's overly cheerful voice recalled Edgar from his attempt to stifle the nervousness he always felt before his sessions by skimming over the months-old magazines that were the staple of every doctor's waiting room. He replaced the magazine carefully on the table beside him, then made his way across the waiting room to the office door, trying not to feel like everyone else was watching him.

He'd been going to Dr. Ramon for a few months now, after admitting to himself that he wasn't going to get rid of Scriabin on his own. It wasn't that he really believed he was insane, exactly, but he had finally had to concede that seeking professional help was what any sensible person would do in his situation. After all, he didn't have anything to lose at this point. Sure enough, after the first few sessions, Dr. Ramon had discussed his tentative diagnosis: dissociative identity disorder, or what Edgar had always heard termed as multiple personality disorder. As Edgar understood it, the idea was that a traumatic experience, usually abuse in childhood, caused one to separate certain emotions and parts of one's consciousness from the whole. This could result in a sense of unreality, or in fugue states, or in fragmentation and confusion in one's very self.

Edgar didn't have any concerns about his childhood--his grandmother had done just fine raising him, thank you--but had a good idea what traumatic experience could have been the catalyst for Scriabin's creation, given the timing. Unfortunately, that was the one thing he couldn't tell Dr. Ramon. He had scrupulously edited all references to Johnny's homicidal tendencies from the sessions, mentioning him only in the context of a close, manic-depressive friend with emotional issues, and promising solemnly to recommend to Johnny that he seek help as well.

So far the sessions seemed consist mostly of Edgar talking about himself, telling the doctor about things like his feelings, his childhood--and about Scriabin. It was such a relief to finally be able to talk freely about the voice in his head to someone, especially to someone who might actually be able to help him, that Edgar's seething hatred of Scriabin had subsided somewhat. Curiously, Scriabin himself had taken Edgar's decision to go to therapy surprisingly well, considering that Edgar meant to get rid of him once and for all. He remained mostly silent during the sessions, occasionally reminding Edgar of a detail he'd forgotten, or offering an insightful comment rather than attacking with the familiar scathing sarcasm. If it hadn't been for Scriabin's response to the doctor's prospective diagnosis, Edgar would have thought that he was actually trying to be helpful for a change.

Of course, that was too much to ask for.

_He's wrong, you know,_ Scriabin had said. _I am _much_ more than that now, Edgar. You won't get rid of me this way._

Still, Edgar felt optimistic, for the first time in a long, long while. So he continued to see Dr. Ramon, to tell him all the things that he'd never had reason to confide to anyone else. For the first time, he talked about his parents' accidental death when he was barely two, about his grandmother's strict but loving care, about her death just before he left for college. More hesitantly, he talked about Johnny and their strange, almost coincidental friendship; about the delicacy and the inconsistency of it, and how unsure it had made him. There wasn't too much else to discuss. Edgar had had a very uneventful life before he had met Johnny, and before Scriabin had made a home in his mind.

"Hello, Edgar," Dr. Ramon said genially as Edgar entered his office. "Have a seat, I'll be with you in a second." And indeed, before Edgar had fully settled into one of the comfortable chairs, the doctor had finished scribbling down some brief note, and taken the chair opposite Edgar. "So, how are you today?"

"Not too bad," Edgar replied. "Work's okay. No headaches this week. And he's been relatively quiet today--if I didn't know better, I'd think he looked forward to these sessions."

"It's possible that he does. That's what I'd like to get into today, actually." The doctor leaned forward in his chair. "In all this time, I haven't really gotten a chance to talk with your alter directly. It would give me a much more complete picture of what we're dealing with if I could see how his affect differs from yours--attitude, body language, worldview, that sort of thing."

Edgar stared at him for a moment, appalled. "You mean, let him take me over again?" Unconsciously, he scrubbed suddenly clammy palms on his pants.

"Are you concerned that he would 'take over'? From your description of the last time, it sounds like he relinquished control voluntarily, even encouraged you to take it back." Dr. Ramon's voice was steady, reassuring.

"Well...yes, but..." Edgar took a shaky breath, trying to quell his unreasonable anxiety. "Somehow I don't think he'd be very cooperative, that's all."

"You say he hasn't been hostile about your therapy. Let's give it a try, okay, Edgar?"

Edgar looked down at his hands, and was surprised to see them clenched tightly in his lap. "Scriabin?" It felt strange to talk to him in front of someone else.

_How very "Three Faces of Eve",_ Scriabin replied dryly. _No, I don't think so. This isn't about me--it's about you._

Edgar looked back up at Dr. Ramon and mutely shook his head.

"Any particular reason why? Can you characterize his reaction for me at all?"

"I don't know. It's like he's just not interested. He says this is about me, not him."

"Hmm." Dr. Ramon sat back in his chair. "Well, as long as he's not actively opposed, I'd still like to give it a try. If the alter can't be brought forward consciously, there are other ways. Would you mind trying hypnosis?"

"Hypnosis...what?" Edgar wasn't sure about that. What if he said something about Johnny? What if Scriabin tried to take control of him again?

"Don't worry, it's not like the movies. I can't make you do anything you'd absolutely refuse to do under normal circumstances, or embarrass yourself, or anything like that. If you like, we can try a milder hypnotic state first, and see if that'll be effective."

Edgar hesitated.

_Don't bother; it's not going to work. I can't be controlled just because you're such a pushover, you know._

Scriabin sounded amused rather than angered by the idea, but Edgar had to wonder if he was lying, as he so often did when Edgar finally had him on the defensive. There was only one way to find out.

"Will I be able to hear anything that's going on?" Maybe if Scriabin knew he was still listening...

"Of course. Mostly, it's just a way to relax you enough to get past whatever barriers are keeping you from consciously bringing him out. With your permission, though, I'd still like to try a deeper state if that fails to bring the alter to the fore."

"You...you can put him back, right? If it does work?" Edgar was almost convinced.

"That's the other point of the hypnotic state, yes."

Edgar considered that for a moment. It didn't sound so bad. "Well, okay...but let's try the mild thing first."

"Preference noted." Dr. Ramon nodded, and gestured to the sofa that stood just beyond the chairs. "Would you like to lay down?"

The sofa was as comfortable as the chairs, and Edgar was soon composed and ready. He took a deep breath. "Go ahead."

"All right, Edgar. Close your eyes. I'd like you to relax..." The doctor's voice took on a steady, rhythmic tone as he encouraged Edgar to deepen his breathing, to let go of any tension in his body, and to clear his mind. As he followed along, Edgar lost track of the exact words, hearing only the ebb and flow of the voice that coaxed him to go deeper, to let go, and he floated along that current, letting himself be submerged in it.

Dr. Ramon watched his patient carefully throughout the induction process, concerned. Apparently Edgar was particularly susceptible to a hypnotic state, as some people were; he hadn't expected him to go completely under quite so quickly. However, it might be an advantage, calming whatever fears either Edgar or his alter might have. Weighing Edgar's anxiety over the hypnosis against the potential benefits, he decided to continue.

"Now, Edgar, I would like you to step back. Let Scriabin come forward, let him speak to me." He saw Edgar sigh, seeming to settle even deeper into the cushions, and instinct told him that he was continuing to cooperate. "Scriabin. I would like to talk to you now...Come out." Edgar remained still, hands folded neatly on his chest. The doctor waited, but nothing happened.

With a start, Dr. Ramon realized that his patient was no longer breathing.

His mind ran through a dozen different options even as he leapt from his chair to Edgar's side and checked for his pulse. It was there, steady and strong, but Edgar was unresponsive. Just as he opened his mouth to attempt to call Edgar back, he jumped back, startled nearly out of his wits as his patient gasped for air and sat up, eyes wide, as if awakening from a bad dream. Dr. Ramon slowly returned to his chair, giving both of them time to recover their breath, and waited to see who he was dealing with.

Finally, the patient fixed him with an indignant glare and said, "Jeez! Don't DO that...you could have killed him." He shook himself out and swiveled to a sitting position on the sofa.

For a moment, Dr. Ramon just stared at him. He'd never encountered such a thing; not only was hypnosis supposed to be perfectly safe for the patient, but the alter was generally influenced by the hypnotic state as well. But as clearly as it was now Scriabin that sat across from him, it was also obvious that he wasn't affected in the slightest. This was going to be a challenge.

"Under no circumstances should hypnosis either harm or kill a patient," Dr. Ramon said as calmly as he could.

"Not when the 'patient' actually suffers from a psychiatric condition, no, I'd suppose not." Scriabin met his eyes easily, as Edgar did not often do, and Dr. Ramon had the impression that he was being studied and evaluated. "But that's not what you have here, Doctor. You can't get rid of me with your therapy and your medications."

"Nevertheless, you don't seem to have any objections to Edgar seeing me."

"It's good for him. Do you realize that this is the first time in his life he's ever told anyone anything about himself? Not that he's got much to tell, mind you. He needs to get out more, that boy." Scriabin stood with a grace that Edgar did not display, and began to wander around the room, looking curiously at various items with both hands clasped behind his back. Scriabin's attitude projected cocky self-assurance, but Dr. Ramon was strongly reminded of a child who has been told not to touch anything.

"You don't seem to have a very high opinion of Edgar."

At that the alter shot him a long look, eyes narrowing briefly before his expression subsided to one of sober consideration. "He does make it difficult sometimes," he said offhandedly.

"Oh?" Dr. Ramon inquired mildly.

Scriabin raised an eyebrow at him, then to the doctor's surprise, began to laugh. Edgar's alter raised his hands in a mockery of surrender, then came to sit across from him in the other chair, leaning back insolently. "Okay, I'll play. Yes, Edgar frustrates me. Yes, there are times when I could strangle him, were my hands my own. Sure, I hate him sometimes. Only fair--he hates _me_ pretty much all the time--but mostly it's just that--" Scriabin shook his head and looked away.

The doctor waited.

Scriabin turned back to him, his expression entirely serious. "He never goes more than halfway on anything. He talks a great game, but then he always makes excuses and finds reasons to avoid doing what he should do--what he _needs_ to do." Abruptly the mockery returned. "Take this therapy thing, for example. I'm under the impression that in order for this to work, a relationship of trust has to form between the doctor and the patient, am I right?"

Dr. Ramon nodded, inviting him to continue. Scriabin was a deceptive one, there was no doubt of that, and while the doctor was encouraged that Edgar's alter was being so forthcoming, he suspected subterfuge, some kind of hidden purpose. He had also noticed how Scriabin kept turning the conversation back around to Edgar, instead of giving anything away about himself.

Scriabin returned the nod, then pointed a finger at him. "Yet he's not really trying. He thinks he's doing oh, so well; but would you like to know all the things he's been hiding from you? And not minor stuff, either--no, he's fully intending never to so much as hint at all the most important things. Basically, everything that would actually give any of this a chance to _help_ him."

"Is that your goal, then? To help Edgar?"

Scriabin laughed at him again. "Come on, Doctor. I never signed up for this. Do you think I'm going to give away _my_ secrets, here? No. As I said before, this isn't about me. It's about Edgar."

Dr. Ramon shifted in his chair. It was apparent that Scriabin was only cooperating for his own reasons--if indeed he could be said to be cooperating--but it was a start to be interacting at all. And he still might let something slip. "It's normal for the patient to withhold things at first. It's only been a few months, and that bond of trust that you mention is still forming. If Edgar hasn't mentioned some things yet, it's because he isn't ready to. Treatment of DID is not quick, or simple; in most cases it requires years of hard work and therapy before the alters are all identified, much less reintegrated." He forebore to mention that sometimes, they never were.

"Edgar has no 'alters', Doctor. Just me." He grinned rakishly. "And I actually don't think it's possible to reintegrate me, anymore."

"Was there a point at which it was?"

"Hmmm, let's see," said Scriabin, affecting a thoughtful pose. "Possibly before Edgar gave me a name?"

Edgar had explained where the name had come from, of course, but this was new information. "He named you?" That wasn't unknown, but it was unusual for such a complete personality not to give its own name.

"Yes, Edgar named me." Scriabin leaned forward, becoming serious again. "Shall I tell you what he told me, when I called him on it, when I _told_ him that was a bad idea? He said--and I quote--'I'll just pull you farther out of myself and eventually I'll go back to normal.'" His voice was intense with anger. "He refuses to take responsibility for anything. Everything just happens to him, and he's just going along with it, giving it his best. Even now, he's expecting you to magically make it all go away, kiss and make it all better, even though he's not going to honestly try. And when he fails, it'll be your fault, or mine--but never his."

"And you have made it your function to remind him of these things."

Scriabin snorted. "Someone's got to."

"Would you say that you have succeeded in this at all? If you had to be honest?" He echoed Scriabin's earlier wording deliberately, wanting to see if Scriabin would hold himself to the same standards as he evidently held Edgar.

The alter looked at him resentfully, then looked down at his--Edgar's--hands. "...No," he admitted after a moment of bitter silence.

Now they were getting somewhere. Dr. Ramon backed off slightly, choosing another angle of approach. "So exactly when would you say you began to become separate from Edgar?"

Scriabin raised his head, a strange gleam in his eyes, and gave the doctor a smile that chilled his blood. "Why, that would be somewhere around the first time his _friend_ Johnny tried to kill him."

Dr. Ramon was stunned. "The first time...?"

"Oh, yes, didn't Edgar mention that? That would be one of those important things I was talking about. Yes, Johnny is the mysterious killer of hundreds of people that no one can seem to find and bring to justice. He fully intends to kill Edgar someday, when the time is right--and Edgar _is fine with this._" Scriabin spaced out every syllable so that the import of those words could not be missed, the anger back in his voice. "Now and then he flies off the handle and tries to kill him anyway--I've lost count how many times." He leaned closer again, as if to be sure he had the doctor's full attention. "And do you know why Edgar allows this, why Edgar continues to associate with dear little Nny? Because he's in _love_ with this man. Of course, he didn't mention that either, did he? No, because he's fighting his own sexuality! He can't admit that he loves another man, because his _God_"--Scriabin made an epithet of the word--"wouldn't approve. He's so far in denial of this that it wouldn't even occur to him to hide it from you."

The doctor listened, aghast. Against all odds, he had almost certainly uncovered the trauma that had spawned Edgar's alter, and at least one important key to the core of his patient's troubles. However, he not only had to contend with the ethical question of whether to break the obligations of patient confidentiality to potentially prevent further violent crime--and if Edgar's friend Johnny was indeed the killer that had been ravaging the city, he could not keep that a secret--but there was also the fact that all of this had been revealed to him in violation of his promise to Edgar to keep him under only light hypnosis. These revelations stood to do more harm than good, jeopardizing the fragile bond of trust that Edgar placed in him, so necessary to the therapeutic environment.

Unless--perhaps Edgar had confided to him through Scriabin, because his alter could say the things that he could not?

Dr. Ramon looked the alter directly in the eye, meeting his seriousness with equal gravity. "And what does Edgar think of you telling me all this?"

"Edgar?" Scriabin was openly scornful. "He's still asleep. Hypnotized. Waiting for you to count to three, or snap your fingers, or whatever it is that you do. He isn't hearing any of this."

So all of it had been brought out before Edgar was ready. Feeling more and more like the session had escaped his control, Dr. Ramon stared at the alter, perplexed. "If you aren't affected by the hypnosis, then why did you come forward?"

"I wasn't going to, believe me. I _told_ him it wouldn't work!" Scriabin snapped. "And then when he stepped back like a good little boy, just like you told him, there was no one in charge! He'd have _died_ if I hadn't taken over!"

"Or you could have stepped forward to begin with, and there would have been no risk." Dr. Ramon pointed out coolly.

The alter regarded him, eyes narrowed again, arms crossed, his expression otherwise inscrutable. Neither of them spoke. The soft electronic tone of the clock on a side table cut suddenly into the silence, startling them both.

"Time's up," said Scriabin softly. "Tell you what. You say I haven't succeeded, that I haven't been any help. Well, I've given you everything you need. You give it a try, and see if you can do any better." He smiled bitterly. "I wish you all the luck in the world."

"Because I'll need it?" the doctor said, matching Scriabin's tone.

"Goes without saying." The alter strode back over to the sofa, laying down with his hands nonchalantly behind his head. "Go on, do your thing."

"Can't you bring him back?" Dr. Ramon was curious.

"Not until you wake him up, and he accepts control. Difficult for him, you know."

He was beginning to understand; Scriabin wouldn't relinquish control until he was sure that Edgar was able and willing to take over. The process appeared to require the active cooperation of both of them. "Edgar. It's time to come back now. Come forward, towards my voice..." The alter watched him as he went through the process that should have brought Edgar back to the fore, and when he was done, it was still Scriabin that faced him.

"Well?" the doctor prompted.

Scriabin appeared to listen a moment, then gave an exasperated sigh and rolled his eyes. "Give us a moment, will you?" he said sourly, then stared, unseeing, up at the ceiling.

Edgar was drifting, bodiless and weightless, when he heard Dr. Ramon's voice again, calm and reassuring, urging him gently to focus outwards again, to come back to himself. He seemed to float upwards, towards that soothing voice, but when Dr. Ramon told him that he could wake up, he found himself still in his own head, seeing the ceiling above him like a passenger looking out through a car window. He started to panic, then heard another familiar voice.

_Calm down, Edgar._

Edgar wasn't going to be mollified that easily. _But..what--_

_You went under like a stool pigeon in cement shoes, dear boy. I had to take over to keep you from forgetting to breathe._

_But--I thought...light hypnosis, he said it would only be light hypnosis!_ Edgar was horrified. What had he said, what had he done?

_Quite a lot, actually. You've been holding out on your therapist, you know._

Edgar felt like he had been doused in cold water. _Scriabin! What have you done?_

_Go and see,_ said Scriabin lightly.

_God, Scriabin, what did you say? Did you tell him about Nny? How _could_ you--_

_No one will believe him. It's you, remember? The whole invisibility thing? Your precious Nny is safe to go on murdering the random multitudes of this city._

_You--you--_ Edgar couldn't think of an insult of sufficient magnitude to contain his hatred. _Give me back my body!_

_Take it, _Scriabin said dismissively. _This wasn't my idea._

Edgar blinked away the momentary dizziness, then looked accusingly at Dr. Ramon. "You said light hypnosis. You said I'd be aware the whole time."

"You accepted the hypnosis much faster than I'd anticipated. Faster than anyone I've ever seen, in fact. I wasn't able to keep you in a lighter state. I apologize." The doctor's voice was firm but soothing, and held real regret.

"What did he say? What did he tell you? God, if I could..." Edgar's hands were balled into fists, and he was shaking.

Dr. Ramon sighed and bowed his head, fingers massaging his forehead. "I would like to go over everything your alter said with you, Edgar. I'll need to, actually." He looked gravely at Edgar. "I am of the opinion that this can't wait until next time. If you're willing, we can extend the session. Off the clock, of course."

Edgar got up and moved slowly to the other chair. "What did he tell you?" he repeated.

"Edgar, how did you meet Johnny?"

He closed his eyes at the question, feeling sick. "No. I'm not telling you anything else until you tell me what he said."

For a long moment, Dr. Ramon was silent, evidently thinking. "He said that you were hiding things from me, important things. I told him that this was normal, that it takes time to build the trust between doctor and patient, that you had not confided these things because you were not ready to."

"But he told you anyway, didn't he?" Edgar did not bother to hide the hatred in his voice.

"He's very adept at deflection; he consistently avoided revealing anything of himself, turning everything back on you. The more I pressed him, the more he evaded. And eventually..."

"And _what_?" Edgar said through gritted teeth. "Quit trying to make it sound better. I've probably heard it all before."

Dr. Ramon looked him straight in the eye. "He said, in summary, that you are tolerating what sounds like an abusive relationship with a violent and unstable criminal in an effort to avoid acknowledging your homosexual orientation."

Edgar couldn't speak for a minute. Somehow, hearing it put like that, so directly, so succinctly, made it sound ludicrously simple. Absurd, really. He suddenly began to laugh. Dr. Ramon had just made one sentence out of what it usually took Scriabin ten minutes to rant at him.

The doctor watched him warily. "You're taking this surprisingly well."

"It's not anything I haven't heard before. He tells me that all the time--except it takes him a lot longer." He chuckled again.

"You're aware that I may not be able to observe patient-doctor confidentiality in regards to your friend. A doctor cannot responsibly withhold information that would prevent a violent crime."

Edgar hoped Scriabin was right about his invisibility protecting Johnny. "I understand."

"Well, then." The doctor was still watching him skeptically. "If you're handling this so well, then perhaps we can go over this in more detail in our next session."

"No. I don't think so," said Edgar slowly.

"Edgar, if you're uncomfortable with today's breakthroughs, I understand. We can back off from those issues a little, approach them in a less direct fashion. But I have to advise you, very strongly, against giving up now, just when you've really started to make some progress--"

"See, that's just it." Edgar shook his head, smiling bitterly. "You believe him, don't you?"

"Shouldn't I? Was he lying?"

"Was he talking? Of course he was lying! He's always lying! And he doesn't understand half of what he thinks he does, either. I am NOT homosexual. I am NOT in love with Johnny. Those are fictions that Scriabin has invented to hide his own weaknesses! But he got to you too, didn't he? You believe him! You bought it--hook, line, and sinker!"

"Edgar--"

"Don't bother! I can see it, I can tell." Edgar got to his feet. "We're done here. If I think I need to continue therapy, I'll do it with another doctor. And I won't be letting myself be suckered into hypnosis again, either." Ignoring the doctor's half-formed protest, Edgar turned his back on him and stalked out the door, slamming it behind him. Everyone in the waiting room jumped. He went to the receptionist and scribbled his signature on the necessary forms as quickly as possible.

"Here's your next appointment, Mr. Vargas," she piped in that grating, falsely cheerful voice.

"Cancel it. I quit." He handed back the card, ignoring her fluttering confusion, and left.

As he waited for the elevators, Scriabin chimed in. _Oh, well done, Edgar. You sure told him--_

Edgar rounded on him furiously. _Just SHUT UP, you bastard, _he hissed. _You've ruined this for me too. Congratulations; now go have a party or something. I don't want to SPEAK to you for the rest of the day, do you understand me?_

Silence. Sweet, beautiful silence. Edgar walked out into the bright sunlight, whistling.

At least this therapy debacle had accomplished that much.

* * *

This story can also be found at Zarla's site--www(dot)ashido(dot)com(slash)igtky--under Fanfics. 


	8. Out

Anyone who has read Zarla's fabulous "Vargas" knows that it can't end well. My imagination insisted on showing me this particular variation of Not Well. Like Zarla, I am not responsible for the mental damage--I just perpetuate it. Don't worry, it'll be over quickly...

* * *

OUT  
by rueyeet

It was no kind of night to be out.

The steady rain matted his hair, plastering it to his face in straggling strands. It soaked his coat, weighting it heavily on his shoulders. It obscured his vision, droplets collecting on his glasses. He dripped as he stumbled along.

Not all of the drips were water.

Things had gone so badly. He ought to have known; all the worst developments in this little soap opera they were all mired in seemed to happen at Johnny's dilapidated house. With every dogged step, he relived the pain of the knife to his gut, each footfall jarring the wound anew. Each gasping breath was drawn against the anguish of betrayal.

He had been rejected, turned away by the one who should have been closest to him. What had always been precarious, a thing of carefully managed extremes, had come suddenly, shockingly undone. The hurt was magnified by the surprise--why hadn't he seen this coming?

The streets were unfamiliar, and he looked around at a loss, reaching out for a nearby telephone pole for support. He'd known that a 911 call from Johnny's would be useless, and had escaped into the dark with the vague idea of finding a pay phone from which he could call, or maybe a cab he could take to the hospital, but around him were only lightless and apparently empty buildings. How had he gotten out of Johnny's neighborhood so quickly? He ought to have knocked at somebody's door or something, asked to use their phone...

Shoving off from the telephone pole, he continued on, not entirely sure where he was going. Where did he have to go, anyway? And why hadn't he thought of that before?

_Doesn't matter_, he tried to convince himself. _Must find help_.

He looked down. Clothes wet with rain were stained with the blood that had spread down from the gash in his belly, a smear of redness that reached all the way to the knees of his jeans. The sight made him faintly nauseated, and he refocused on the deserted street, concentrating on putting one foot in front of the other. He didn't know how long he staggered blindly onwards, but he still saw no one. No cars passed him. There wasn't a soul to hear his ragged breathing, to watch his steps waver, to see him sink back against the wall of the empty alley, sliding down to sit with his arms loosely at his sides like a discarded toy.

Head back against the brick, he tasted metal in the raindrops that fell in his open mouth, runoff from the fire escape above him. He tasted blood as well.

Scriabin closed his eyes dizzily against the falling rain.

Again he felt the curious stretching pulling sensation as they were separated, and one became two. Saw the crazed hatred in Edgar's eyes as he snatched the knife from the floor, saw the flash of the blade as Edgar lunged at him with a hateful scream, saw Johnny's horrified astonishment at the sight of his own knife in Edgar's hand, smeared with blood. Heard Johnny cry out, "Edgar, NO!" as he leapt to restrain a second attack. Felt the pain and the hurt and the betrayal.

Edgar had kicked him out.

_Just pull you farther out of myself and eventually I'll go back to normal_, Edgar had said to Scriabin the day he'd given him a name. And he'd finally succeeded--except that the result had been anything but normality. Scriabin had been forced to run for his life from an Edgar who was no longer passive, no longer a doormat, no longer under his control.

The irony of it cut worse than the knife. Scriabin, who had so scornfully claimed that he didn't need Edgar, that he would be fine on his own--who had so castigated Edgar for not needing anyone, for not feeling loneliness--was now dying, friendless and alone, bereft of the one person who made his existence relevant.

He would have laughed, if it didn't pull so at sliced muscle and torn flesh. Would have wept, if he had any strength left to him.

The dizziness increased, and he felt his body grow heavy and distant. It seemed like he could hear each and every raindrop as it struck the pavement, the fire escape, his upturned face. He was obscurely comforted; if he could not weep, at least the world wept for him.

* * *

Some time later, a thin figure entered the alleyway in the wan sunlight that filtered through the dissolving clouds. It stopped, hesitated, then bent over the motionless form that slumped against the brick in a red-tinged puddle, checking.

The silence was broken by a soft curse, then the figure stood. "Fucking bastard," Johnny said softly, and with venom. There was desperation in his eyes, and bruises on his face. "You _would_ go off and leave me with this."

He stood a moment longer, then turned and walked away, leaving the body to the rats.

END

* * *

This story can also be found at Zarla's site--www(dot)ashido(dot)com(slash)igtky--under Fanfics.

Author's note: This fic is completely Scriabin's fault, for showing up on the doorstep of my half-sleeping brain in this condition.


	9. Kept

"Out" didn't really require a follow-up, and probably shouldn't have had one; but apparently there's something wrong with me.

* * *

KEPT  
by rueyeet

Halting footsteps trailed slowly down endless stairways, echoing in the dark and empty rooms at every landing like the screams that used to give those bloodstained spaces vitality and life. Gone were the moans, the whimpers, the angry threats, and the pleas for mercy. The devices of torture stood unoccupied, neglected. All of the myriad basement chambers of that house, like the cells of a tumor multiplying out of control, were empty now.

Except one.

Johnny made his reluctant way down flight after flight of stairs towards that one room, his shame and his fear hidden as deeply away as the expansive prison of his house would allow. He didn't really need the flashlight he carried--the way was so familiar that he could have traversed it in the pitch darkness. He'd switched off all the lights. They didn't seem appropriate anymore.

Finally he reached the door at the bottom of all the steps, the torment and treasure at the end of his obscure and convoluted personal rainbow. It just went to show what one got for believing in fairy tales. In ideals. In perfection.

He juggled the flashlight with the container of food he carried--experience had taught him that a plate was too easily overturned--and got the key from his pocket, turned it in the lock, opened the door. Just beyond the dim circle of light provided by the flashlight, a figure stirred, soft clinking sounds disproportionately loud in the silence. Even the voices didn't seem to be able to reach this far down.

"...Nny?" The voice was hoarse with disuse.

"I'm here." As always, Johnny had to take a moment to steady his voice. "I brought some food."

"Food...yes. I must be hungry. Aren't I?" came the query, as if grasping at something forgotten.

Johnny couldn't bring himself to answer. Instead, he cautiously advanced a few steps, bringing the light closer. Shadows resolved into a lowered head, shaggy hair falling to hide its features; light glanced off the buckles of the straitjacket and off the links of the chains that trailed from neck and ankle back into the darkness. When there was no further reaction, Johnny settled himself cross-legged on the floor and opened the plastic container.

"Here," he said softly, offering a piece of bread at arm's length. There was no movement in answer, and he called a little louder, "Edgar."

Edgar raised his disheveled head, neat goatee grown into an unkempt beard, madness in his eyes. "Should I be hungry?" he asked again.

"Yes. It's been days." Johnny continued to hold out the bread.

"But I can't die." The slyness in Edgar's tone reminded Johnny uncomfortably of Scriabin. "I don't need to eat, do I?"

"Edgar...don't. Please. Just...we've been through this. You're hungry, you know you are. Here." Desperately, Johnny leaned as close as he dared.

Gaze fixed on Johnny, Edgar leaned forward as far as the neck chain permitted, and took the bread in his teeth; chewed and swallowed it. Silently, Johnny gave him the rest of the food in the container, piece by piece. Edgar's eyes never left him, staring out between the wayward strands of his tangled hair.

Johnny wished, not for the first time, that he had done something--anything--differently. Would they be here now, would things have unraveled so unbearably far, if he had never taken Nailbunny's advice and called Edgar that first time? If he had never told Edgar what he intended, had never allowed Edgar to touch him? If Edgar had not followed him to Heaven and to Hell, if the Devil had never singled him out for the fate that should have been Johnny's? Maybe he should have killed Scriabin when he showed up on his doorstep, wearing Edgar's body like a favorite coat; maybe he shouldn't have let Edgar kill Scriabin when the two of them came apart before his eyes, Edgar's own rejection and denial so strong that he was finally able to amputate the hated figment like an infected limb, casting away that piece of himself forever.

Ever since he had become aware of Scriabin's existence, Johnny had assumed that the voice in Edgar's head was like the voices in his own: something to tear him down, wear him away, steal his sanity until nothing was left. Edgar never did talk about it much, but Johnny was sure he felt the same way. No one--not Johnny, certainly not Edgar, and perhaps not even Scriabin--had been prepared for what Scriabin took with him, away from Edgar. Sanity. Rationality. Control.

What was left of Edgar had attacked his other self viciously with one of Johnny's own knives. Johnny could still remember the surreal feeling of seeing Edgar explode in the violence so foreign to him, and so familiar to Johnny; like looking in a twisted mirror and seeing another face on his own reflection. That, more than any concern for Scriabin, had motivated him to try to stop Edgar's second slash. Edgar had struggled and fought, twisting and refusing to let go of the knife, until Johnny had finally had to resort to knocking him out yet again. By that time, Scriabin had vanished.

Shaken and bruised, Johnny had restrained Edgar in a sub-basement before he set out to look for Scriabin, just in case. He was unsure of his motivations, responding more to a need to nail things back down, to try to impose some control over the situation, to keep the pieces of it from slipping away, than to any kind of concrete plan. He had searched the rain-soaked streets, sure that Scriabin couldn't have gotten far. Once he had all the pieces, maybe it would be possible to put them back together again.

Too little, too late. By the time Johnny tracked him down, Scriabin was dead, bloodless corpse already stiffening, that piece of Edgar's mental puzzle irretrievably gone. It somehow seemed entirely appropriate, Scriabin's last laugh, that Edgar should be abandoned by his own self; that responsibility for Edgar should fall to the only other person he had left.

Johnny reached for another chunk of food, carefully reduced to manageable pieces, before realizing it was all gone. He uncovered the water bottle, flipping out the attached straw, and offered that as well. Today, Edgar took the straw without complaint, sipping the water without once breaking that watchful stare. Then, as per routine, Johnny set both containers down near the door, and went to unfasten Edgar's neck chain from its ring on the back wall.

"...Nny? Nny! What are you doing?" Edgar's voice took on a tinge of panic.

Johnny made no reply, the flashlight held in his teeth as he unfastened the heavy lock, then hoisted Edgar to his feet. Immediately, he backed away, flashlight in one hand, chain in the other, towards the other corner of the room where a rusty sink and toilet stood. Edgar shuffled anxiously after him. Another ring adorned the wall there, and Johnny fastened the chain to it, making sure the lock clicked soundly home. Then he approached Edgar and started to undo the buckles of the straitjacket.

"You're not letting me go, are you?" Edgar pleaded. "You're not making me go away, are you?"

The last buckle came loose, and Johnny tossed the straitjacket back into the corner from which they'd come. He avoided Edgar's stricken eyes. "Of course not."

Hands free of their restraints, Edgar reached hesitantly towards him. "I'm yours, aren't I?"

Johnny marshaled all his courage and stood his ground, shuddering as Edgar clung to him desperately, the touch making his skin crawl. "Yes. Mine."

"Forever?" Edgar asked eagerly, looking into Johnny's face for reassurance.

The word reverberated in Johnny's head, bringing with it a vision of them both old and withered and white-haired, still caught up in this routine. His reply came out in a whisper. "Forever..." Gently but firmly, he removed Edgar's searching hands and turned to go.

"You're leaving?" Disappointment colored Edgar's tone, and he stood forlornly in his chains.

"You ate. You have things to do. I'll be back, you know I will." Leaving the flashlight on the floor by the door, its light reflected from the ceiling dimly over the whole room, Johnny closed the door and leaned against the other side for a minute, eyes closed, fighting off the urge to burst either into tears, or perhaps crazed, hysterical laughter. He began the long journey back up the steps, finding the railings automatically in the dark, not missing the flashlight's feeble glow, knowing that as soon as he neared the top, the voices would be waiting for him, just as Edgar waited below.

They always were.

END

* * *

What is it with me and practical details? I was always the one watching Edward Scissorhands and wondering how the hell he copes with the bathroom.

This story can also be found at Zarla's site--www(dot)ashido(dot)com(slash)igtky--under Fanfics.

Aaaand that's all she wrote for this little divergence in Zarla's continuity, folks. Hope you enjoyed the ride.


End file.
